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About Me

I'm just your basic, all-American girl from Denver, Colorado, except for now, I live half way around the world in Japan.: ) I met my husband in university in Denver. College sweethearts. We have been happily married since 1997. And have been together for way longer, about 16 years total. He's originally from Osaka, Japan. We lived for a couple of years in Honolulu Hawaii, where our beautiful first born son, Branden was born. We were sent there by the company my husband works for. He works for an airline by the way. After living in Honolulu, my husband's employer, wanted us to move to Japan. We live in Chiba, Japan. Where we just built our dream home, an import "all American" house! Which means a big GE oven, big GE dishwasher and yes, central heating and central air conditioning, yay! We also have a beautiful second son, named Noah. Since my husband works for an airline like I said, we travel a lot and I really do appreciate the flight benefits. Other then that, I just love spending time with my family and friends and enjoy back yard BBQ's.

Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Mother's Day 2014!

I hope everyone had a lovely Mother's Day! I know, I did. : ) It was very low key, as always. I think last year, I picked a couple DVDs for my Mother's Day gift from Amazon, you know, just something I wanted to see and have on DVD. And this year, I picked some skincare stuff and popcorn making items. Yep, I like "useful gifts", type gifts, something I can watch and rewatch again and again or read or get to use (like skincare) or enjoy... you know what I mean, I hope. : ) I'm really enjoying this face wash, it smells so good and the hand cream is amazing. Good picks this year!

You ever get on a kick? I know, I do and I know a lot of other people do too...anyway about 2 years or so ago, if you remember, I went on a smoothie kick. I bought 2 smoothie recipe books and I went full blast on those for a whole summer. Hahaha. @.@ Well, I am on a bit on a popcorn making kick right now. I'm sorry folks, just bear with me, I am sure by the end of summer, it could very well fizzle itself out. Maybe not though... because we have *always* loved popcorn, but...it's just what I'm really into at the moment. I found a place online in Japan that sells professional popcorn oils and the salt/butter flavor you add in the pan while cooking/popping, the kind used at the movies. The prices were cheap. Very fair and so, I ordered 2 professional "popcorn oils" and 1 coconut oil. I have been reading threads via Amazon what other people like and they were split between popcorn oil and coconut oil. This place sells it all, so I gave both a try. That salt/butter seasoning you add only 1/2 of teaspoon and since this is 1kg, I'm sure this will last a billion years. Hahaha. So needless to say, I have been experimenting trying to get the perfect "tastes exactly like the movie theater popcorn taste" down and by George, I think I've got it. ; )

I just put the oil into this bottle that I got at Target in Hawaii last June.

Popcorn making, the latest happening in our neck of the woods.: ) But you know...we're not hurting anybody and it's just popcorn, so not a bad "hobby" of the moment, I'd say. : )

So the morning of Mother's Day, we all enjoyed some breakfast, here at home. I enjoyed a nice cup of hot coffee. My plan was, I wanted to stay home and just enjoy being at home. I had a "kids club" meeting for us head/lead mom's, the night before from 7:30pm-8:45pm. It was fun though, gosh my fellow VP and I were cracking up laughing at a bunch of stuff. Anyway, so yeah since I had a meeting Saturday, I just wanted to chill out at home Sunday. However, I did mention to Noboru, Sunday morning that "on Monday you and I should head to Costco because I want to pick up some pancakes for the boys for breakfast during the week and some cheese because I am making a batch of homemade gratin potatoes and also a small batch of homemade macaroni and cheese this coming week and I need the cheese." Noboru said, "let's go today, it'll be fun"...I was more like...ehh... meh, no...there'll be a billion people, can barely move a cart around on weekends where as the weekdays are dead...like a ghost town. But, the kids were like..."oh I wanna go"...another kiddo chimed in..."I want the ice cream in a cup before we leave"...Judging by the way their faces lit up...I was like...alright, we can go. : ) So, we went, on a Sunday. @.@ It was pretty busy in there, but I managed to get my stuff and check out as fast as humanly possible. 2 packs of pancakes. And Monday's are a swim night at our house so a quick fast meal truly appreciated, so that whole chicken was for Monday/yesterday evening.

Mozzarella cheese, yep we really go through a big 2 pack of this once a month. Yes we eat lots of Italian at our house. : ) Chicken paremesan, you name it, we make it. And the big hunk of Colby/Jack for gratin and mac and cheese.

Finally they restocked the bigger tortillas, perfect for sandwich wraps or morning fast breakfast burritos. And that's it. We did have lunch there, it was so crowded, I didn't even remember to take a pic of our food. I had a huge slice of combo pizza, Branden had a gigantic slice of pepperoni pizza, Noboru and Noah both had a hot dog each, Noah just ketchup and Noboru had every topping. We had sodas and we had 2 soft creams, and the 4 of us split those (they are huge). It was a great Mother's Day lunch. And though it was packed to the gills, I was glad Noboru and the boys enjoyed going and I enjoyed it too plus, was happy to have the big hunk of cheese and the pancakes. So yeah totally worth going. : )

Noboru asked me all week, what I'd like to do for Mother's Day dinner, should we go out to eat or should he make something here at home? You know...I knew about my Saturday meeting, since a month ago and I told Noboru a few days earlier, "let's just enjoy dinner at home" So we did that, he made ebi furai/fry at my request. And he also made a chicken cutlet for Noah since we know he's not fond of shrimp. Which is fine, Branden used to not like it either and now he loves it! : ) I sat in the kitchen a bit and watched him clean and de-vein the shrimp.

Plating up every one's meal. He kept telling me go sit on the couch and relax, let me take care of everything, he'd say. So, I did sit on the couch for the majority of the time he was in the kitchen, at his request and it was nice to relax and have him cook dinner. He is such a good guy! Just always wants to see me smile and happy! : ) I want the same for him too!

The meal he made especially for Noah. 2 mini sized chicken cutlets. Noboru sliced one chicken breast into 4 and made 4 mini cutlets for Noah. So, if he wanted 2 more, he could have. Corn, rice 2 fries and that lettuce we grew ourselves! : )

Noah enjoying his dinner on Mother's Day!

Branden, also enjoying his fried shrimp dinner!

And my actual dinner on Mother's Day 2014. Anyway, I want to keep this post nice and short, so that's what we did for Mother's Day this year, 2014.

By the way, this has nothing to do with Mother's Day at all, but it's sorta big news right now so. Beyonce's sister attacked Jay-Z in an elevator. OMG! Anybody see the video. What is up with Solange Knowles! I saw that video footage this morning via TMZ twice and from what I saw on the video was, she lunged, she connected a few shots and then she even kicked him! He didn't hit her back or anything, he just stood there. Thank goodness, the body guard was trying to hold her back. That was some craziness happening in that elevator! I do wonder what got her so riled up. Hope they can work out, whatever problem they seem to have. But wow, that video. : (

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About the Blog

This blog was started for everybody I care about and love back home, it sorta helps my family and friends feel more connected to me and my life. It's also a place to make new friendships, support one another, laugh our butts off at times, and just be kind to one another and hang out! So please join me, while I try living my life in Japan, all the good, the bad and yes even the embarrassing blunders that I will probably be making along the way! : )